The Stranger's Hand

The Stranger's Hand (Italian: La mano dello straniero) is a 1954 British-Italian thriller-drama directed by Mario Soldati. Adapted from Graham Greene's draft novel of the same name, it follows the son of a British MI5 agent who is kidnapped in Venice by Yugoslav agents as he searches for his father. The screenplay was completed by Giorgio Bassani and Guy Elmes, working from roughly 30 pages of a "film story" that Greene prepared as the basis for the picture.

The film has a curious origin: Greene had anonymously entered its first two chapters, under a pseudonym, in a New Statesman competition to write in the style of Graham Greene — and won second prize. Soldati read the chapters and persuaded him to finish the novella. The principal cast includes Trevor Howard, Alida Valli and Richard Basehart.